Dante’s phone vibrates into his pocket and he gently pulls out from our embrace. He extracts the cell from the inside his jacket and flips it open.

“Yeah”, he says, coldly, his eyes staring at the floor.

He listens for some seconds, then his jaw clenches abruptly.

“Hold on”, he just says, in that same cold tone. He switches on the loudspeaker and throws a rapid, warning glance at us.

“Lieutenant, are you still there?”, the male voice says.

“Yeah. We’re all listening”, Dante replies, staring at the phone in his hand.

“Who’s we?”, the man asks, a bit sarcastically, and from his tick accent I can say he’s not a natural Anglophone… He sounds different. He is a stranger, but not Italian. He doesn’t have the same accent Dante has.

“It’s me, Shane and Carmen”, he replies coolly.

“Who is it?”, Carmen asks, and the man chuckles joylessly.

“Miss Morales, speak when I ask you to –“.

“Cut the bullshit. Say your line”, Dante interrupts him, and the man remains silent for a long time. We can only hear his breath through the microphone.

“Okay, lieutenant. We have Miss Pieszecki and Miss Williams. And Miss Cassandra, of course”, he says, flatly.

Instinctively, I put both of my hands on my head and my eyes pop out in surprise and terror. Carmen closes hers, like she’s just been punched. Dante says nothing and the man pauses a little more.

“…Aren’t you going to tell me the usual lines, Lieutenant? You know, that ‘if you just touch ‘em, I’ll kill you?’…”.

“No”, Dante replies, firmly, “I’m asking you who’s ‘we’. This is what I wanna know”.

The man chuckles again.

“You’ll figure out everything very soon. The game is almost at its apex”.

“Okay. Tell me where and when”.

“Tonight. At midnight. Culver city. There is one big mansion at the end of the main road. A Victorian house. Right outside the town. You’ll find it. I know you will”.

“Yeah, we will”, I reply.

“Lieutenant, I guess it’s useless to add that cops must not be involved, isn’t it?”.

“Nobody is involved”, Dante says.

“True. You know that we’re watching you”.

“I know”.

“Come alone. The three of you. No weapons”.

“Leave the girls out of this”.

“These are the rules”, the man replies immediately, in a flat tone, “The three of you. No weapons. Do what I am asking you to do. You see that we have no problems in scarifying people for the sake of our game”.

“The sake of your game?!”, Carmen snaps, “You fucking motherfucker, I’m gonna strip the skin off –“.

“Keep Miss Morales on the leash”, the man says nonchalantly, and I place my hand on Carmen’s forearm, pressing my forefinger on my pursed lips. She closes her mouth, but her whole face is twisted in rage.

“Did you find Mister DeNardo?”, the man asks then, casually. Dante closes his eyes tighty, as if he’s trying to erase the image of his dead body from his mind.

“Yes”.

“Was he in a good shape?”, the man giggles.

“Before this story is over, I will kill you”, Dante says coldly, and hangs up.

TBC